DevilDawg81’s New Lawn - 2023 Edition

[DevilDawg81]

Hello everyone back at it again in 2023. This time is a much smaller area. When we first built and moved in this area I left untouched as the farmer who plants crop in our field out back would drive down this section. It is ~3,000 square feet.
When we planted our first large area (13k sq ft) I left this area out and for 3 years been waiting to get back to it. For the previous two weeks I’ve been applying glypho to kill what weeds and nonsense we’re growing. I scalped around day 5 after initial kill.
This past Monday I took 1/2 day off work. Sowed 13 lbs of SeedSuperStore Sunny blend I had leftover. Then I covered it with about 5 bales of straw. Setup four sprinklers on a Mel or timer and off we go. Temps have been below average here as of late. Officially Day 0 is April 24. I’ll keep everyone apprised as things progress. Good luck to everyone this year

Frost from the other morning:


Seed down:

[edslawn]

Thanks for sharing this and good luck with the project! One thing, it looks much easier to keep watered

[DevilDawg81]

Thanks Ed! It is a nice flat area. Unfortunately tonight we got about 1” or more of rain. An absolute monsoon. But I’ll assess it tomorrow. Some of it had grass I killed off and likely protected some of the seed.

[DevilDawg81]

It has been nothing but rain since Friday. The only time I’ve been outside was to mow what I could on Sunday. As for this new area, it’s very saturated and some spots are just standing water. I haven’t even ran out to see if anything’s germinated. That could be a sin

The weather is to start turning around here tomorrow with rain diminishing and warm temps returning for about a week. I’ll assess the situation later this week



Current situation

[edslawn]

Heartbreaking... we got the same rain here in PA and the creek behind our house flooded. Rained like crazy all weekend... No danger to the house, but my wood stairs got torn off their mounts. Hopefully, they can be saved... best of luck with the grass!

[MorpheusPA]

Seed won't mind standing water for a day or three or even five (in nature, it's not like it's completely stagnant, usually, across the entire section). Erosion...erosion would be a problem.

Fortunately, the weather looks to clear this weekend and warm rapidly, so that's nice. I'm putting in the gardens while I dance around raindrops, and that's an exercise where you dig in mud. The plants really don't mind; they object to the cold more than they do the wet.

[DevilDawg81]

I experienced worse rainfall during a spring seeding in 2021. I think we got 5-7” of rain around Mothers Day weekend. Things turned out okay then and that was a 10k area. This is a dwarf compared to that, and I’m not really sweating it, so what happens happens. The outlook does appear much better and I’ll too be getting the gardens/flower beds in.

Morph I hope I don’t have much erosion, there could be some I suspect. I’ll see.

Edslawn…hopefully you can get the stairs back with no major issues!

[DevilDawg81]

Area is very saturated with water. I’m positive seed got washed away in some spots but I’m not reseeding new use more rain is in the forecast for the weekend.

There is some germination popping up with the warm temps

[DevilDawg81]

Germination is picking up as the weather has gotten warmer. Nothing earth shattering, it’s a spring Reno, fall is definitely the primo time.

[edslawn]

Looking promising!

[DevilDawg81]

Thank you! I’ve definitely learned patience is key especially with lawn care

[DevilDawg81]

More germination and noticeable sprouting everyday. The weather has cooperated and looks to continue to do so in the long range forecast.

[DevilDawg81]

It has been hot and dry here. No rain for awhile and none in the foreseeable future. I haven’t backed off watering, still at 3x a day.

From afar it looks filled in, but it still has more to go. I may be getting the reel mower out soon

[edslawn]

Looking great!

[DevilDawg81]

Thanks edslawn! Cooler temps have moved in this week. I plan on getting the reel mower out at some point this week and giving the first hair cut.

[DevilDawg81]

Ran the reel mower over the entire site. I’m happy overall with the growth given the whacky weather we’ve had. We went from cold and monsoons to extremely dry conditions. Temps have dropped to the mid 70s so I’ve backed off of watering. This mornings temp was 39!
Crabgrass has started to develop with some other weeds and they’ll be present thru the summer. Once the heat breaks in the fall I’ll hit it with quinclorac. That’s been my typical pattern for the spring plantings

[DevilDawg81]

I’ve cut this new section a handful of times. Today I used the zero turn over it but turned on the adjacent sections. I definitely have weed presence and will take care of them in the fall. We’ve had adequate rain where I haven’t used the sprinklers for a couple weeks now.

[edslawn]

Looks great! Definitely odd weather... Our weather in central PA has suddenly changed gears from warm and dry to cool and drenched. Rained all night and forecast shows this continuing through the weekend.

[DevilDawg81]

Looks great! Definitely odd weather... Our weather in central PA has suddenly changed gears from warm and dry to cool and drenched. Rained all night and forecast shows this continuing through the weekend.

Likewise. We’re gearing up for the latter this weekend. I’m happy and sad at the same time. We’ll likely green up some, but my lawn will have a lot of standing water.

Such a catch 22

[edslawn]

Such a catch 22

I hear ya! I woke up this morning to a biblical downpour. Grass seems happy but the knockout roses look pissed .